We have several educational (Math) apps in App Store, and while there were some ups and downs before, for the most part they were slowly going up in their App Store rankings (for keywords) and download numbers. Then several month ago they started to go down, especially our two main ones, Matrix Solver Step by Step and Graphmath, for example, Matrix Solver used to be second or third for "matrix calculator", now it is 6th-7th, even though in recent months it received quite a few 5-star rating (more than before), and average rating is 4.8, but now we are getting other low rated apps (with 1 to 3 star average rating) ranked above it in searches. Similar with Graphmath, it used to be 20-30th on "graphing calculator" (I know, there are hundreds of them), now it is somewhere in 100+ area, and on more specific keyword combination where it was the first or second, now it is 7th or 8th (and again, it got several good ratings recently) Do you have any idea why this might be happening and what can we do about it? It also looks that there is a "developer rating (or ranking)", because sometimes all of our apps are getting more views and downloads, and now all of them are going down. Apple denies it has anything like that, but maybe anybody else has seen it? We also have heard that paid apps and apps with ads get higher rankings, so we might try to make Matrix Solver a paid app ($1), at least for a while and see what happens

Hello, we have received a crash report from AppStore connect / Xcode, TCC_CRASHING_DUE_TO_PRIVACY_VIOLATION on an iPhone 12 Pro running iOS 18.1 (unfortunately, we don't know the user and how did they get the crash) The log mentions NSPhotoLibraryAddUsageDescription, but we are not using photo library in any shape or form, do we still need to include this key in Into.plist? And what do we put there? Thanks! Full log will not fit here, but here is a about half of it, with parts that mention crash (Thread 7), PhotoLibraryServicesCore, PHPerformChangesRequest determineAuthorizationStatusForChanges (Thread 4) and Binary Images, including /System/Library/Frameworks/Photos.framework/Photos /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/PhotoLibraryServicesCore.framework/PhotoLibraryServicesCore (not sure why are they there) Incident Identifier: 5AFB7CCF-ECEC-40E1-AF71-02799924BC8C Distributor ID: com.apple.AppStore Hardware Model: iPhone13,3 Process: Polynomials [8291] Path: /private/var/containers/Bundle/Application/168A2A15-821B-414A-84B6-43C5184E5B59/Polynomials.app/Polynomials Identifier: com.graphmath.PolynomialsSbS Version: 5.1 (16) AppStoreTools: 16C5031b AppVariant: 1:iPhone13,3:18 Code Type: ARM-64 (Native) Role: Foreground Parent Process: launchd [1] Coalition: com.graphmath.PolynomialsSbS [2383] Date/Time: 2024-12-10 05:23:26.6944 +0200 Launch Time: 2024-12-10 05:16:45.7989 +0200 OS Version: iPhone OS 18.1 (22B5069a) Release Type: Beta Baseband Version: 5.10.01 Report Version: 104 Exception Type: EXC_CRASH (SIGABRT) Exception Codes: 0x0000000000000000, 0x0000000000000000 Termination Reason: TCC 0 This app has crashed because it attempted to access privacy-sensitive data without a usage description. The app's Info.plist must contain an NSPhotoLibraryAddUsageDescription key with a string value explaining to the user how the app uses this data. Triggered by Thread: 7 ... Thread 3: ... 9 UIKitCore 0x000000018dac114c closure #2 in InProcessAnimationManager.startAdvancing(_:) + 156 (InProcessAnimationManager.swift:900) 10 UIKitCore 0x000000018d5cd118 thunk for @escaping @callee_guaranteed @Sendable () -> () + 36 (:0) 11 Foundation 0x00000001898296c8 NSThread__start + 724 (NSThread.m:991) 12 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x000000021304937c _pthread_start + 136 (pthread.c:931) 13 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x0000000213044494 thread_start + 8 Thread 4 name: Thread 4: 0 libsystem_kernel.dylib 0x00000001daf24604 semaphore_wait_trap + 8 1 libdispatch.dylib 0x000000019288466c _dispatch_sema4_wait + 28 (lock.c:139) 2 libdispatch.dylib 0x0000000192884d20 _dispatch_semaphore_wait_slow + 132 (semaphore.c:132) 3 PhotoLibraryServicesCore 0x00000001a37cde70 -[PLPrivacy _checkAuthStatusForPhotosAccessScope:preflightStatus:promptIfUnknown:resultHandler:] + 532 (PLPrivacy.m:554) 4 PhotoLibraryServicesCore 0x00000001a37cd9e0 __87-[PLPrivacy _isPhotosAccessAllowedWithScope:promptIfUnknown:synchronous:resultHandler:]_block_invoke + 240 (PLPrivacy.m:587) 5 libdispatch.dylib 0x00000001928840d0 _dispatch_client_callout + 20 (object.m:576) 6 libdispatch.dylib 0x0000000192893750 _dispatch_lane_barrier_sync_invoke_and_complete + 56 (queue.c:1104) 7 PhotoLibraryServicesCore 0x00000001a37c2c44 -[PLPrivacy _isPhotosAccessAllowedWithScope:promptIfUnknown:synchronous:resultHandler:] + 156 (PLPrivacy.m:582) 8 PhotoLibraryServicesCore 0x00000001a385af74 -[PLPrivacy checkPhotosAccessAllowedWithScope:] + 136 (PLPrivacy.m:608) 9 Photos 0x00000001a2b99854 -[PHPerformChangesRequest determineAuthorizationStatusForChanges] + 52 (PHPerformChangesRequest.m:417) 10 Photos 0x00000001a2c59a78 __102-[PHPhotoLibrary _performCancellableChanges:withInstrumentation:onExecutionContext:completionHandler:]_block_invoke + 80 (PHPhotoLibrary.m:2044) ... Thread 7 Crashed: 0 libsystem_kernel.dylib 0x00000001daf36ec4 __abort_with_payload + 8 1 libsystem_kernel.dylib 0x00000001daf56bec abort_with_payload_wrapper_internal + 104 (terminate_with_reason.c:102) 2 libsystem_kernel.dylib 0x00000001daf56c20 abort_with_payload + 16 (terminate_with_reason.c:124) 3 TCC 0x00000001ada4eb10 TCC_CRASHING_DUE_TO_PRIVACY_VIOLATION + 172 (TCC.c:579) 4 TCC 0x00000001ada4a210 ___tcc_server_send_request_authorization_block_invoke_3 + 124 (tcc_server.c:322) 5 TCC 0x00000001ada4e230 __tccd_send_message_block_invoke + 624 (TCC.c:0) 6 libxpc.dylib 0x00000002130adc40 _xpc_connection_reply_callout + 116 (serializer.c:119) 7 libxpc.dylib 0x00000002130a0390 _xpc_connection_call_reply_async + 80 (connection.c:894) 8 libdispatch.dylib 0x0000000192884150 _dispatch_client_callout3 + 20 (object.m:602) 9 libdispatch.dylib 0x00000001928a1b2c _dispatch_mach_msg_async_reply_invoke + 340 (mach.c:3102) 10 libdispatch.dylib 0x0000000192896f98 _dispatch_root_queue_drain_deferred_item + 336 (queue.c:7291) 11 libdispatch.dylib 0x00000001928967cc _dispatch_kevent_worker_thread + 500 (queue.c:6764) 12 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x0000000213047cb4 _pthread_wqthread + 344 (pthread.c:2702) 13 libsystem_pthread.dylib 0x0000000213044488 start_wqthread + 8 Binary Images: ... 0x1a2b1e000 - 0x1a2e98fff Photos arm64e <286e53b489dc3526809cde731d193edd> /System/Library/Frameworks/Photos.framework/Photos 0x1a37bf000 - 0x1a38d8fff PhotoLibraryServicesCore arm64e <2ef5261171363f638de0424b4a0ad257> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/PhotoLibraryServicesCore.framework/PhotoLibraryServicesCore 0x1ada46000 - 0x1ada5dff0 TCC arm64e <8d07479816c73b24a7cc13b7e3f6f361> /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/TCC.framework/TCC 0x1d6b63000 - 0x1d6b6bfff GraphicsServices arm64e /System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/GraphicsServices.framework/GraphicsServices ...

Hello, we found something odd happening to at least 3 of our apps (we have 6 total) at App Store: in the statistics provided by App Store Connect we can see that somebody is downloading all the old versions of our app on their Desktop (another odd thing, our apps are intended for iOS, meaning iPad/iPhone, not MacOS desktops) Couple of questions: how is it even possible, to download an old version of somebody else's app? have you ever seen this with your or somebody else's apps? We have already contacted Apple Support, they said they will investigate it, but we have not heard anything back from them thanks!

Hello everyone, this is my first question here, we (me and my wife) wrote our first iOS app, GraphMath, which is a graphic calculator, and released it in August, it is in AppStore, can be downloaded, here is the link, https://apps.apple.com/us/developer/yuri-morozov/id1582368813 but cannot be found by its name, GraphMath. If you put "graphmath" in the search, it will return a lot of related or unrelated apps. When we first released it on Aug 24, this was the case, then after an update and call to Customer service the second version appeared in the search for a day or two, but then, after the next release, disappeared again, and this was and still is the case for the last almost 2 months, despite multiple calls to App Developer support and their assurances that they are "actively working on it". There is no other app called GraphMath, there is only a GraphMath2, which also cannot be found by searching "graphmath", but can be by its full name, "graphmath2" What is also interesting that AppStore algorithm knows about our app: if you add almost any word, like "graphmath math" or "graphmath graph" or "graphmath calculator" or even "graphmath ipad", it will find it, along with that other Graphmath2. Even more interestingly, if you put "graphmath graphmath" (meaning do not add ANY extra info, besides the keyword graphmath), it returns our app, but it still does not return it if you just put "graphmath"... I have searched the forum and found several questions like this (mostly from 3-4 years ago), but could not find any resolution, does anybody know anything about it? thanks!

Hello everyone, this is my first question here, we (me and my wife) wrote our first iOS app, GraphMath, which is a graphic calculator, and released it in August, it is in AppStore, can be downloaded, here is the link, https://apps.apple.com/us/developer/yuri-morozov/id1582368813 but cannot be found by its name, GraphMath. If you put "graphmath" in the search, it will return a lot of related or unrelated apps. When we first released it on Aug 24, this was the case, then after an update and call to Customer service the second version appeared in the search for a day or two, but then, after the next release, disappeared again, and this was and still is the case for the last almost 2 months, despite multiple calls to App Developer support and their assurances that they are "actively working on it". There is no other app called GraphMath, there is only a GraphMath2, which also cannot be found by searching "graphmath", but can be by its full name, "graphmath2" What is also interesting that AppStore algorithm knows about our app: if you add almost any word, like "graphmath math" or "graphmath graph" or "graphmath calculator" or even "graphmath ipad", it will find it, along with that other Graphmath2. Even more interestingly, if you put "graphmath graphmath" (meaning do not add ANY extra info, besides the keyword graphmath), it returns our app, but it still does not return it if you just put "graphmath"... I have searched the forum and found several questions like this (mostly from 3-4 years ago), but could not find any resolution, does anybody know anything about it? thanks!